


When the sea gives

by notquiteaphoenix



Series: R76 ABO week [2]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Creatures & Monsters, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-02
Updated: 2019-10-02
Packaged: 2020-11-15 09:47:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,145
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20864210
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notquiteaphoenix/pseuds/notquiteaphoenix
Summary: Jack has spent almost every night of a year on that pier, singing to an empty sea.Finally, the mermaid returns. With a small surprise.





	When the sea gives

**Author's Note:**

> This is very, very lightly ABO and not exactly traditional so I did not tag. This is also exceedingly late for the R76 ABO week and I found it randomly while looking for my mer!Jack fic idea today nearly finished and decided to finally get on it. So here, have some mer!Gabe.
> 
> Please see endnotes for content warning.

“Your choice in music has gotten worse.” A familiar voice carries over the water, clear yet with an eerie echo. “Do you always have to sing sad shit?”

Jack’s voice stops, the air gone out of his lungs. His fingers pause on the guitar strings and he searches the water for a sign, something to make the voice real. “You like to sing about drowning people and sinking ships.”

He spots dark hair in the calm water beyond the pier, a face just above the water. Jack breathes a sigh of relief. It’s been more than a year since the mermaid left. Others—humans and mers alike—warned him of their likely ending; Jack to be either forgotten or drowned.

Jack always hopes for the second fate, even as many weeks of singing out to the empty sea passed.

Familiar dark eyes peer at him. “Better than boring and sad.”

And yet that _ boring and sad _ love ballads still catch Gabriel’s attention. Jack mock glares at Gabriel, “Yours have sad ends, too.”

“I wouldn’t call dinner sad,” Gabriel says, grinning with sharp teeth. 

“Is that why you’re back? Coming to sing me to...dinner?” Jack hopes his words are merely part of a tease but he’s always been aware of the danger. “I’m not as young and tender as I used to be.”

Gabriel ignores the question. “Remember where we first met?”

Jack wants to laugh; he can’t imagine forgetting where he first met a mermaid—forget any detail from when he first met Gabriel. “I suppose I do.”

“Good. Meet me there.” And then with a move that’s all show, Gabriel dives into the water, the red streaks on his tail shining brilliantly in the sun before he disappears from view. 

Jack doesn’t quite run; this rocky side of the island rarely attracts visitors but no need to draw attention to himself if someone happens upon his favorite little slice of the world. 

(He leaves his guitar on the pier. If he doesn't return, that will be answer enough to Ana.)

He makes his way down to the little stretch of the beach between the cliffs. There isn’t a real path; the closest thing is a stair-like part of the cliff wall that Jack first found as a teenager. 

Jack reaches the bottom and sees the stark colors of Gabriel reclining against the grey rock of that false pier that edges out of the cove. He starts to make his way around sharp stone and tidepools. There is no true path but Jack is familiar enough.

He hears a whisper of siren call. Not to him, not calling him to his doom, just curiously soft. 

“You take forever,” Gabriel calls out as Jack nears. His body is entirely out of the water, save for the end of his tail that dips into a tidepool. It’s a strange sight; Gabriel has always preferred enticing Jack into the water. 

“It’s a long walk.” And dangerous in a way his teenage mind never considered, even as surely Jack had to pick careful footing then as he does now. Then, he didn’t even know what awaited him beyond rock and water. 

“You should have swam.”

Jack bites his tongue. That’s a fight they repeat a million times; Gabriel knows very well humans are (relatively) slow swimmers. He certainly likes to mock Jack enough for it. And normally, Jack would rise to the challenge and argue; he’d give a lot of money to see Gabriel _ walk._

But he’s missed Gabriel. And he’s tired.

Gabriel looks tired too. No longer surprised by his reappearance, Gabriel seems skinnier than Jack remembers and his hair looks messier than usual. 

“Come here.”

Jack eyes him warily. Wouldn’t be the first time Gabriel decided to amuse himself by dragging Jack into the water, pulling him under, and leaving him literally breathless.

(“Makes you more agreeable” Gabriel once said, and Jack supposes it’s true; between the strong embrace and the low oxygen to his brain, Gabriel has talked him into many things. Very few he actually regrets and it’s not like he has actually died yet.)

But they are feet from water deeper than a couple feet and while Gabriel is strong, he is slower on land.

Jack stands before Gabriel, unable to resist his gaze tracing from brilliant tail to more familiar human chest with alien gill lines just beyond the abdominal muscles and up to a lazy smirk. 

“Come closer.” The siren-song crescendos, welcoming yet still not demanding.

Jack leans closer before he can help himself. The rocks, however, he knows are less welcoming. “Close as I think I can be.”

Gabriel rolls his eyes and pulls him down onto the solid but thankfully smooth expanse of his tail. “You humans and your soft skin.” His claws dig into Jack’s chin, not that Gabriel needed any help keeping Jack’s gaze.

“You’re the one that didn’t want to stay at the docks.”

Gabriel scowls. “Too much noise and pollution.”

It’s not a _ new _ complaint. Just not one Gabriel has ever seemed to care about before. 

Then again, the mermaid has never been gone so long before either. “Gabriel—”

“Shh,” Gabriel’s claws direct Jack’s sight to the tide pool where his tail fin fans out in the water and—

Oh.

Jack has never seen a mermaid so _ small_. Even young Hana’s tail is longer than he is tall. 

Her primary scale color is black, much like Gabriel and easily blends in where she curls up in the crook of his tail, half-submerged in the tidepool. In fact, she reminds him a lot of Gabriel, beyond her accent lines being blue and gold—such a contrast from Gabriel’s white and red—she has the same copper-warm skin and dark curls. 

The sharp line of her nose though reminds Jack of his own. “Is she…”

“Ours.” 

The faint line of siren song curls in the word but so short it barely tugs at Jack’s attention. Jack freezes, not stuck with any sort of magic, just realization.

Jack never thought—couldn’t have imagined...sure, Gabriel’s body is different—lovely and hot and welcoming and completely unforgettable and Jack still dreams of those nights—but _ this _possibility never occurred to him. 

“Oh.”

Gabriel shakes his head. 

Jack brushes a stray piece of seaweed off her face. Her eyes widen and she moves, faster than he’s used to babies—human babies—moving and _ bites_.

Jack flinches but she looks up at him with dark, beautiful brown eyes—Gabriel’s eyes—and he laughs, the pain is easily ignored for the light feeling in his chest. “She has very sharp teeth.”

Gabriel splays his tailfin, revealing the elegant red and black stripes in a preening gesture Jack is well acquainted with. “She’s perfect,” His voice dripping with an intense smugness.

Jack doesn’t fault him or argue.

Gabriel is right, she is perfect.

**Author's Note:**

> CW: There are hints of lack Jack's lack of care to his own life and mermaids eating people. This story is on the sweet side, though. Kinda ABO, but nothing descriptive and leans a bit more alien biology handwaving. 
> 
> I definitely have A Thing for mermaids and selkies. When looking through my docs for the other fic idea, I found 5 potential R76 mer and selkie fic ideas, as well as 5 others for Overwatch and even more for other fandoms...
> 
> Feel free to commnet or find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/wwmusing), or [pillowfort](https://www.pillowfort.social/notquiteaphoenix).


End file.
